


Attack On Fashion

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Everything except EreRi is platonic, F/F, Fashion AU, M/M, Model AU, Multi, Non-Binary Hange Zoë, Project Runway AU, Slow Build, all the aus, designer au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-09
Updated: 2014-06-09
Packaged: 2018-02-04 01:46:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1762159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Levi has made it to Project Runway, a place to kick-start his dreams of being Capital B Big in the fashion world. He's confident in his ability, his cool head and his ideas. Unfortunately, he's not as confident in his model.</p>
<p>Eren is running from a secret past, one that only his best friend Armin knows. He joined Project Runway as a way to grab his dreams and run with them, but the question is, will his designer win?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Attack On Fashion

The models were all wearing the same outfit; a white tank top that clung to their bodies in the most unflattering way possible and black shorts. Eren was tugging at his shorts when Armin sidled up to him and grinned.

"You looking forwards to this, Ja-"

"Finish that word and I will kill you." Eren hissed, keeping his voice low. "I want this to be something I get on my own, ok?" 

Armin nodded, the grin still on his face. "I'm just so excited. There's a full spread in Elle on offer!" He brushed a strand of his carefully styled hair out of his eyes, and Eren had to crush the desire to ruffle it as it would destroy hours of hard work from the stylists backstage. 

"Line up," Shadis hissed at the models, "you're on in a few seconds." 

Armin darted away, Eren dragged himself up from the wall he was leaning on and fell into line just behind of the hugely oversized Reiner. The models in front of him swung their arms and put on their best pouting faces. 

"Go!" 

They walked, all of them, in a perfect line. Their hips swung in a pendulum motion and their heads were held high. Each had a spark of themselves in their eyes, and they knew that it was do or die. 

"Welcome our models!" Pixis was grinning as he gruffly waved them on stage. They lined up behind him, each standing in the way that best accentuated their features. 

Reiner was stood with his arms crossed and Armin was stood with his hands clasped in front of him, Annie was stood with her head high and eyes focused on something above the designers heads. The others stood with hands on hips or behind their backs. Eren just stood, eyes scanning each of the contestants in front of him. 

The first was a blonde man, far too muscled to be a casual gym goer, he had a short sleeve t shirt on and it showed a prosthetic limb joined to his arm just above the elbow. The limb was pretty, silvery grey and outlined with thick black. Fashionable, just typical for a designer. 

The second was a young blonde girl, she looked like she was probably the youngest in the group. She had an intense glare going on, but her hands were fiddling with each other. Zoned out, he guessed. The third was a young boy with a crew cut and huge lemur eyes. The fourth was a teenager, maybe a man in his early twenties, who was bigger than Reiner even. The fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth were all male. One looked a fair bit older than Eren guessed he was, the greying hair made him look ancient. The other two looked very young, the eighth had a shock of dirty blonde hair. None of them really looked like designers should. 

The only other girls that Eren could see were sat next to each other. One was very quiet, demure almost. She had a steel look to her, like Annie did on a bad day, but it was softer and less outright obvious. She was at the very least partly Asian, very short and thin too. She could have been a model if she'd chosen. The other girl was a woman wearing a button up shirt with thick glasses and her hair pulled up into a messy bun. She had a smile on her face of the likes Eren had never seen before. She looked almost deranged. 

The last contestant gave Eren the creeps. He was an angry, quiet guy who sat with his arms folded and a serious look on his face. He was wearing a silk black shirt and black jeans. Something frilly and white was tied around his neck, and a white watch strap was on his wrist. He looked like he was wearing eyeliner, but Eren was too far away to be sure. His eyes were scanning each model, and he managed to look away before that gaze caught him. 

"These are the models you'll be working with!" Pixis explained, mostly for the cameras, "But this is the first week and you know nothing about them, so we're going to show you their walk and then there's a party! You'll get your first challenge tomorrow!" 

Eren remembered being told once that Pixis attended a lot of high fashion parties, always with a drink in hand, and dressed in the same immaculate suit he was wearing now. It was frustrating to think that Pixis was on television in that godsend of an outfit and he might as well have been wearing a sack. The frown on his face must have shown because a few gazes flickered to him. 

The models waked back up the runway to the top of the stage. The first to stride was Annie, her long walk was graceful and her turn was perfect on the balls of her feet. The lack of shoes didn't even impact on her professionalism. Then Armin followed, his walk much the same but less sexy. He was more "cute" than "hot" and the walk showed that. He managed to bounce. 

The blonde duo were followed by Sasha, who was constantly eating and never gaining any weight, Jean, Eren's sworn enemy, Mina, Petra, Erd, Hannah, Ymir, Moblit, Reiner and then himself. He could feel the cold stage beneath his feet and the gentle sway of his hips as he moved, both of which made him very self conscious. The blood rushed to his face, and the only thing that he could think was 'at least it wasn't rushing somewhere else'. 

\--

The party was literally just on the rooftop. It was a nice evening now, the sun was setting and the moodlighting of the small roof space got the atmosphere going. The models were all wearing their own clothes, which meant that a lot of the designers were reevaluating them. Eren felt surprisingly self conscious as he stood with a champaign flute in hand and a baggy hoodie thrown over his faded grey top and ripped skinny jeans. 

"Eren, right?" one of the designers sidled up to him; it was the strange one, but he had met stranger people in his lifetime and sometimes the crazy ones won. Look at series one for gods sake, that was a complete surprise win. 

"Yeah, hey." Eren offered his free hand and she took it gingerly. "You are?"

A grin flashed across her face. "Hanji Zoë." 

"Zo?" 

"Zoë. You can hear the ë." 

"Oh." Eren nodded, "Cool."

"Who do you think is going to win?" She asked, not even pausing. 

"I- what. It's too early to tell, surely?" Eren stumbled. The strange woman was watching him with a half smirk on her face and a strand of that ridiculously long hair falling over her eyes. 

She shook her head. "I wouldn't say so. Do you smoke?" 

"No."

"Shame that." Hanji shrugged. "You'd look good with a cigarette." 

"I look good without lung cancer." Eren replied. 

There was a second of awkward silence before Hanji burst into the most vigorous laughter Eren had ever witnessed. He had heard of horse laughter, but this was something else entirely. Hanji was making so much noise the other models and designers had turned to look at her and, by extension, him. 

After her laughter stopped, Moblit approached to see if she was ok. Hanji nodded, wiping the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand and began discussing the theory of relativity with the poor boy. 

He sidled away from her and found Armin, who was chatting with the blonde man who had the prosthetic limb. Armin introduced him, and they shook hands. Eren found the man was called Erwin, and he designed a lot of clothes for women in need of specialist clothing. Eren wanted to ask what specialist clothing was, but he restrained himself.

"I know you're dying to know." Erwin said quietly. "You're easy to read.

"Know what?" Eren asked, faking as much innocence as he could muster with a straight face. 

The designer pointed to his arm. "This." 

"Oh... Well, I'd be interested if you wanted to tell the story." 

"It was a wild animal attack when I was quite young, ripped it clean off. I was hunting with my father one day and... Boom, woke up in hospital minus one arm." The blonde grinned and swept his hair back with his real hand. "That's one of the stories anyway." 

One of the stories. He was also pretty strange, but with he amount of care he took with his own appearance it was definitely possible that he would be a strong contender. 

Eren laughed along with Armin, who looked absolutely smitten. He was so, so in love with Erwin's personality... Eren wondered if the blonde man would choose the boy for his designs. If he didn't, Armin would be heartbroken for sure. The kid wasn't exactly good at keeping low level attachments. 

"Ah," Erwin smiled at Eren, "I believe someone else is here to talk to you. Armin, would you mind letting me take your measurements? I feel as though your look is exactly what I want." 

Armin's smile practically leapt off of his face. Eren turned around and found the dark haired girl staring at him. She was looking him up and down with quite a critical eye. 

"Smile." She said. Her voice was soft but demanded respect, rather like the rest of her. He did so, giving her a camera worthy grin. She tsked her teeth and made a face. Eren blinked. "Not my type. It's a shame, you're brilliant. We could have won if you'd been a little sharper." 

"Sharper?" Eren asked, the champaign flute in his hand feeling heavy. "What do you mean?" 

The girl stepped forwards, without Eren actually seeing her move, and held her fingers under his chin. She twisted his face one way and then the other. "Your jawline," she murmured to him, "it's so childish. How old are you?" 

"Eighteen."

"That explains it." The girl clicked her tongue and suddenly Eren realised she couldn't be that much older than him. He peered at her. 

"You're quite young though, aren't you?" He asked. She nodded, but gave no reply. 

"It's a shame." She repeated. "You're a good model, you have the walk and your eyes are... Frankly, beautiful. But you're still a child." 

"If you want sharp," Eren said quickly, "Annie has that kind of face. She's Russian, so she has the whole sharp thing down to a T." 

The girl raised an eyebrow and Eren scanned the room. "The blonde girl?" 

"Yeah, her. She's a fabulous model. I mean, one of the best. Really, she'll get you to the final." 

The girl nodded. "I know, I want her. But everyone... Everyone else was looking at her. Except the tall blonde one and that tiny dark haired man." 

"Oh?" Eren's eyes snapped to her. "Who was Erwin watching?"

"Erwin?" 

"Tall blonde guy." Eren explained. 

The girl nodded. "He was watching your short friend. The little blonde boy. Very effeminate, perfect for blurring the gender lines." 

That, Eren agreed, was one way to describe Armin's particular brand of beauty. He'd always figured that Armin would make a great female model but he'd never actually said anything, and yet here was someone else voicing the opinion for him. 

"Sorry," he blurted without thinking, of course, "I actually don't know your name."

"Mikasa." The girl said softly, bringing her own champaign flute to her lips. "Yours is Eren, right?" 

"Yeah." He wanted to ask how she knew his name when he didn't know hers, but it was a party and he - along with the eleven other models - were the feast. The designers would be fools not to talk between themselves about them. 

"I think," Mikasa smiled, peering over the boy's shoulder, "you have someone interested in you." 

"Who?"

"The short man." 

\--

Levi was hiding at the fringes of the party, the shadows suited his taste better than the bright lights. He had a cigarette in hand, and occasionally brought the tip to his lips and sucked the smoke into his mouth. The taste, especially on cold nights like these, was exquisite. 

He brushed the ashes from the ledge he was leaning on and looked out onto the city. This was New York, the fashion capital of... At least this part of America. He aimed to get to Milan or Paris someday, but New York was a start. 

The noise of the party drew his attention and he turned around. A few groups had collected and were chatting to each other. He recognised the tall blonde, the woman with glasses and the white or grey haired boy that he was sharing his room with. They were all at different corners of the party; the blonde had the feminine boy with him and was whipping his tape across his chest, making mental notes and rather approving faces, glasses was talking to one of the quieter models, this kid had some kind of a bowl cut but managed to not look awful with it, and the other one was flirting with a soft faced blonde model that was so far out of his league it was unreal. But she was blushing, so he was getting somewhere, obviously. 

He caught the eye of the Asian girl, who was talking to someone with his back to Levi. She said something to the boy, who turned around. Levi felt a flicker of recognition but couldn't place it. He knew the boy, but from what? He turned his back on the pair of them. 

The kid wasn't a great model, too broad and very sloppily dressed. He would probably show up a few hours late and not apologise. Even if his eyes were stunning, the boy was going to be a liability and probably one of the first models out.

"Excuse me?" The boy had appeared beside him. Levi shot him a glance. "Why aren't you with the rest of the party?" 

"I don't want to make friends with people that won't stay, and most of these people won't stay for long." Levi said, his voice nearly at a perfect monotone. 

The boy placed his glass down on the ledge that the shorter man was leaning on. He crossed his arms and leaned down, his legs kicked out behind him and his eyes at the level of the man next to him. He gazed out onto the streets below. "You might not be here for long either, you know?" The kid muttered, not even looking at him. 

"I know." Levi said, but truthfully he had never even thought about it before. 

"What's your name?" 

"Levi." He replied without thinking. 

"Just Levi?" 

"Just Levi." He confirmed. The cigarette in his hand was crumbling to ashes so he tapped it with his thumb and felt the weight halve. 

The boy glanced back at him, an amused smile on his face. "Like the jeans?"

Levi nodded slowly, eyes glazed over as he stared at the city spread out in front of them. "If it helps you remember it, yes." 

The boy stood up. He was a few inches taller than Levi when he was leaning down, so when he stood up he was nearly a foot taller than the designer. "I'm Eren. Just Eren." 

"Ok just Eren." Levi nodded, bringing a cigarette back to his lips.

\--

The night passed in the manor thus, drinking and smoking and making small talk. Once the clock hit midnight the lights were dimmed down and each of the designers were asked to leave the rooftop. The camera men packed up and went home for a scant few hours sleep before returning in the morning.

A few designers decided that they would like an early night, and went to burrow into their beds, but the rest decided that they would continue the party within one of the apartments they had in the Atlas building complex. 

They had enjoyed the night, and now were spending time in each other's company without the added watch of the camera men. More jokes were shared, and more wine and beer consumed. Levi had the unfortunate position of being housed in the room that the party was allocated to. 

"Shortie!" The bespectacled brunette yelled, "Come here and join us!" 

Levi was dragged reluctantly to their conversation. There were models and designers sat nearly on top of each other as they crammed into the space on the couches and countertops. "We're telling secrets." 

"Are we now?" He asked, dryly. 

"Yes, yes, yes. What's _your_ secret?" 

Levi shook his head. "Yours first." 

"Hmmm," they paused for a second and then grinned. "I have the perfect one!" 

"Tell us Hanji!" Armin clapped. He was joined by a few excited models and drunk designers. "Tell us!" 

Hanji winked. "I'd rather show you." 

The designer stood up and began unbuttoning her shirt, which was received with a loud whistle from one of the models. Probably Ymir, who was leaning on Christa really heavily and causing the little blonde girl to blush a deep pink. 

Hanji tugged the shirt down her shoulders and caught it in her fingertips as it draped off of her form. The shirt was off and her physical form was fully revealed, flat planes across her stomach with a deep V for her hips. She was gorgeous. She reached back and unclasped the bra, and slipped it off gently. As it was removed, so were her breasts. Hanji stood in front of them with a typically male chest on display. 

"I'm not a girl." Hanji grinned a them all. "Not a boy either, before you ask."

Levi nodded, his respect climbing for the strange person standing shirtless in the middle of the room. 

"What are you then?" Auruo asked, the wine making his voice a little slurred. 

Hanji shrugged. "I don't know. But you can call me Sir or Ma'am." There was a peal of laughter from them, "Most people stick with 'oi you'." 

"Damnit Hanji, you've stolen the best secret. No one can compare with that." Erwin smirked. "Not even me, and I was hoping to tell you all about my arm." 

Eren looked down at the floor between his feet as Erwin spoke, Armin nudged him softly. The blonde's face was flushed pink and he had an absent smile. "You ok?" 

"Yeah, yeah." Eren forced a smile back at him, "I'm just thinking about going home." 

Armin checked his watch, sighed and nodded. "I'll come with you. I only live down the road so we can share a cab." 

Hanji grabbed Levi's hands and peered into his face. "What's your secret, mister?" 

The dark haired designer caught the end of Eren and Armin's conversation, them making their excuses and leaving. Most people were ignoring their exit because Levi's secret was about to be told to them all, they hoped. 

"Come on Levi!" Hanji coaxed, "Tell us!" 

Levi sighed and wrenched his hands from Hanji's grasp. "Ok shitty glasses. I'm saying this once and only once, my secret is that I'm gay." 

There was a murmur around the room, much like when Hanji's top had been removed. The blonde model, Petra, seemed to sag a slight bit, but Auruo's hand on her waist kept her upright. Levi walked away from the group, "I'm going to bed. Keep it down."

**Author's Note:**

> This is completely written for the person that got me into the fandom; hypermanica. Absolute babe by all accounts, and a pretty amazing friend too. 
> 
> Ok, that aside, I hope you enjoyed it. I'm working on this as fast as I can but I'm only on the middle of the next chapter, so I'll post that as soon as I've finished it. 
> 
> Any critiques are welcome, that includes characterisation and grammar and just general... Everything. Thanks.


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